Description

My academic concerns have grown out of my long involvement in the conservation of wild places and the restoration of areas severely impacted by human activities. I worked for many years as a wilderness ranger in Montana and then for twenty years as a President of an ecological restoration company. These experiences led me to want to examine in depth the possibility of a new relationship between humans and nature that was reciprocally appropriate and that addressed the profound environmental crisis we currently face. In particular, my graduate work focused on both the philosophy of technology and environmental ethics in attempt to understand how technology has influenced the way that we take up with the more than human world in general and wild places specifically. Since receiving my M.A. in Philosophy I have developed and taught academically rigorous field courses for the Wild Rockies Field Institute in the areas of environmental ethics, global climate change, ecological restoration and human/land relationships in the western United States. During the academic year I teach ethics and introductory humanities courses for the Department of Philosophy and the Davidson Honors College at the University of Montana. I am, also, affiliate faculty in the Wildlands Restoration Program at the University of Montana where I supervise undergraduate student practicums in ecological restoration.